tack up a bed sheet in place of a door
behind it put Eyecandy in place of a wife:

her water’s broke and the junk’s on my hands
my hands in place of Doc-boy’s
my hands scratching round for ammonia
in place of smelling salts
in her black purse in place of a medicine bag
my hands tugging at a water-head
in place of a baby, washing its body
in a blow-up pool in place of a tub
in place of a baptismal font
in place of living water

I thought it’d be easy to act like other folks
is it easy?

2. seventeen-year locusts

I named our water-head Adeline
put her half-born--she made a quarter hour--
in the side yard under the half-step
by half a sedan, transmission greasing up the hood
the couple washingtons I had on me
slided in a flour sack she just fit in
her crown a see-through pink
through burlap

times I’ve sworn I hear my girl grow:
a seventeen-year locust molting for the last
time and “V. Cleb,” I’ve heard myself say
a mason jar, a bar of lye on the sill
“no point making yourself good
looking no more.” you ain’t hearing
me, God: “my flesh and what else washed
down with the shave water”

3. fake money

Eyecandy cries mascara
until the ink runs on
the bills she hides in her bra
(same as a stupid salting the still
he hid in his own chicken coop)

lagoon. cattails. chevy. triple shag
g-string. mosquito-bit tits
dishwater hand. dishwater hair
coal spills invisible as ink spell “censure”
singe her cinch her synch her singer

4. little gal Adeline’s age

in her daddy’s hawaiian shirt
in her brother’s swim trunks
between the two drywalls left

of the burnt-out filling station
I used to take up rattlers in

her ponytail dripping
her bones sticking out
her hand squeezing a note

her visor bending the sun. Adeline:
the shaded face I bear in mind
the mind I’ll bear in

5. the wrong thing always takes the poison

lo. a coon so blowed up it looks hollow
its snout so triangular it stabs the side of my blow-up pool

it’s dusk. I like drinking on my hood

newsflash. the sludge rising in my side yard
it ain’t oil, it ain’t the devil pissing on his ceiling. it’s

dusk. the wrong thing always takes the poison
thus the coon traps, every last one, rusted open

6. the inspector’s new colored suit

filling an ink pen on my half-step, he says there’s “radio action”
in my well, says I ain’t well
and mutes some twenty gadgets

here’s the static I’m fluent in: my finger in an electric
socket until Jesusbaby comes,
other things that break up:

purple florets and fur of my last sweet potato
of my last bowl of coffee
did I boil out the lead

the lead in Adeline. her rabbit hole. her black-eyed susans
her plastic tulips--
the inspector’s empty buttonhole--

7. beds that vibrate for a quarter

the bed sheet dimpled by cigarette burns
Eyecandy mashed against the headboard
the maple veneer nearly picked off
a pillow under the small of her back
pillow pattern over her face

is there a pattern to the bottle rings
old and new, on the nightstand?

her cigarette butts swell, they float

she--“this mattress vibrates for a quarter
and for a nickel bag I’ll”--shrugs
the screen’s stapled shut. there are no bugs

other things lurk here, others need fixing
a bottle behind the busted tv screen’s claw
the shaggy nails behind Eyecandy’s press-ons

8. Adeline’s ghost

there are still others I can see through:
the louse on my thigh
the gold paint on Eyecandy’s face
the tie strings on her nightie, her nightie
the lye soap on her nightstand
a night lizard on the stapled screen, the screen
and my front teeth and Adeline’s crown
and Adeline’s ghost

yet where is the muddy bottom of the lagoon I used to lap?

9. V. Cleb turns devil worshipper

float off, little tie-on nightie
thing like fuzz off a window unit
and tie up the tongues Eyecandy’s speaking in
float off lye soap that gave me the albino eye
float louse float off you darting through my pubes
float off chicken knife with the melted
plastic handle that I pin like a dart to Eyecandy’s
throat float off messy mattress and the shag
carpet Eyecandy’s gizzard-mess is seeping
through. it didn’t go right. float

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